Abstract : Last decade, the need for wireless sensors solutions as core-solutions of Structural Monitoring gained in interest. The cost of wireless devices compared to the cost of wiring important structures (bridges, energy-plants,...) is attractive. Most of recent development in WSN domain focused on energy (saving or harvesting), on wireless protocols, on embedded algorithms. But it is a fact that, most of monitoring applications need samples to be time-stamped. According to the application, the wished time resolution could be up to one second
for automation monitoring, one millisecond for vibration, one microsecond for acoustic monitoring, one nanosecond for electricity or light propagation... The consequence for a Wireless network of electronic nodes is that, by nature, no
common signal could physically provide a synchronization top. But, as each electronic device, a wireless sensor time-base uses a timer incremented by a quartz whose initial value is theoretical up to some p.p.m. and whose period drift on time because of age, temperature,... Two kind of solutions could be regarded : a synchronization signal provided by the wireless protocol itself; an absolute synchronization from a referential source such as: GPS, Frankfurt clock, Galileo,... In the first way, it will be demonstrated the poor accuracy and the need of energy such a mechanism offers. In the second way, the article will details how a deterministic (Universal Time), accurate and resilient algorithm has been implemented. The article also provides specific results of application on acoustic monitoring system and electricity propagation where the accuracy of a WSN has reached up to 10 nanosecond UT. Consequence on energy consumption of this algorithm are given with a description
of future works to improve the energy balance while keeping the device sober and synchronized.